Franciscan Studies

126BOOK REVIEWS welfare of the entire body. A mutilation such as vasectomy or castration "performed for genuine therapeutic purposes in accord with the findings of medical science does not conflict with the individual's obligation to conserve the bodily integrity conferred on him by the Creator" (p. 76). This work of Fr. Lehane is heartily recommended to all readers of Franciscan Studies. His bibliography is excellent although he could have profitably added the noteworthy contribution of Fr. Antoine D'Eschambault's D.D., D.C.L., Eugenical Sterilization (Winnipeg, 1937). Bonaventure A. Brown, O.F.M. Holy Name College, Washington, D.C. Head Above the Stars. By Rev. Giles Staab, O.F.M. Cap. (New York, N.Y.: Frederick Pustet Co., Inc., 1945. Cloth. Pp. xv+171. $2.00.) This is an excellent book for recommendation to religious and the laity alike for light spiritual reading. Divided into three parts, it presents thirty-two essays on subjects taken from the life of Christ, and religious mysteries and teachings, with practical reflections. These reflections always to the point are frequently gripping. The book, written in a beautiful language and style, is simple enough for the average Christian but to the better educated it suggests profound thoughts for meditation. Although intended for leisurely spiritual reading, a busy preacher might find in these pages some useful material and practical suggestions. Kilian J. Hennrich, O.F.M. Cap. Our Lady of Sorrows Friary, New York, N.Y. Moira — Fate, Good and Evil in Greek Thought. By William Chase Greene. (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1944. Pp. viii+450. $5.00.) The present opus is the only single * work which has appeared which "undertakes to deal with the group of questions that confronted the author." It is detailed and complete, and shows a thorough familiarity with the bibliography of the subject-matter. In style it is for the most part clear, although the wealth of material cited sometimes obscures the main progress of the argument. The first chapter is an outline of the whole book; the second deals with early Greek poetry; the third, with orthodoxy and mysticism; the following four with tragedy and the three tragedians; the next three with Socrates and his predecessors, Plato and Aristotle; the final chapter on Fate and Providence summarizes the Stoics and Epicureans, the New Academy, Neo-Platonists, and the transition to Christianity. A series of some sixty-eight appendices (a paragraph each in length) gives additional bibliography and discusses various points in greater detail.2 The "Bibliography" itself is excellent and the book concludes with two indexes: 1.Other works on the same or related themes cited in the bibliography are by: Allègre, Berry, Leach, Pack, Russell, Tournier, and others. 2.Particularly fine are numbers 28, 30, 31, and 35. BOOK REVIEWS127 one of names and subjects (in English and transliterated Greek), and the other of Greek words and phrases.3 Under Moira, for example, can be found a topical summary of the sections of the book dealing with fate. The author's attitude, philosophically, is on the whole optimistic (3); and in scholarly matters, conservative. In a sense, the whole work is an attempt to explain the origin and nature of the concept of evil among the Greeks (3-4) and of the freedom of the will4 as against law and causality. Fate is first conceived by the poets as equivalent to the will of the gods (though free-will also exists and not all evil comes from the gods); by the philosophers, more impersonally, as law or power;5 by men generally, as itself, fate. These ideas were superceded by chance,6 popularly; and by providence, ultimately (the Stoics and Christianity). A development can be traced from an external to an internal conception of life. While no ultimate answer was possible (4), a progress of ideas does exist, with evil ultimately explained as the absence or incompleteness of good.7 In morality various virtues developed corresponding to these attitudes and the essential problem of justice is raised (first by Theognis)8: why do moderation (sophrosyne) and pride (hybris) both meet the same fate. The heart of the work is in the chapters on tragedy...